Welcome to From the Book

After graduation, I was hired by my home church as a teacher in their Christian school. I taught seventh and eighth grade math, history, Bible and Phys ed. I loved teaching history and the Bible, was a horrible math teacher, and didn't mind teaching the boys physical education class. I also coached the Jr. High basketball team and was the assistant varsity soccer coach.

Jr. High is  a tough group to teach. I taught math, Bible, Ohio History and gym. I enjoyed it all except math. I could do math, but not explain math. I still wonder how many of them to this day blame their math deficiencies on me. I remember the first time I tried to address a discipline problem. A young lady kept talking in class. I asked her to stay after the bell rang and began to scold her. She immediately began to cry. Please no crying, anything but crying. I told her it was ok, don’t worry about it. I knew from that point on, I was in over my head.

I remember one class period in particular. I had a student named Shane. His mouth was smarter than his mind. He was always making cracks during the lessons. This particular day he was especially vocal. I asked him to stay after class. I explained to him that this was my class, I was in charge. I didn’t need his help. Now the rest of the story.

The biggest problem was the class schedule. We had gym the second to last period of the day and Ohio history the last period. So after running around for 40 minutes, they had to come and sit still for 40 minutes of history. It was impossible to get them to concentrate for the full class period. So the truth was, I usually prepared for about 20 minutes, figuring if I got through that much I would be successful.

  On the day that I had spoken to Shane, we had gym (if I remember correctly we were playing basketball). When we came back to class for Ohio History I immediately noticed that everyone was sitting quietly at their desks. I began to teach. There were no interruptions. I taught my 20 minutes of material and had time left. I said, well that’s enough for today; you may talk among yourselves until the bell rings. Nobody moved. Nobody said a peep. They just sat there until the bell rang. Shane was the last one to leave. He stepped up to my desk. He said, “Whose class is it?” And walked out.

I was not married. It was while teaching I met my future wife. She was also at the Christian school, but not as a teacher, as a student. No, not one of my students, she was a senior. We didn't date till after graduation, but we did flirt. Now, of course, I would be deemed a sexual predator or at least a stalker. I always managed to be in the gym during my break, when she was there being a teacher's helper. She helped me grade papers. Actually she had known my brother and sister from school for years, but we had never met. When she came in the eighth grade, I had already left for college. She and my sister were in the same grade. My best friend Joe introduced us the summer I came home after graduation. He told me he had met this girl that I should meet. Her name was Sharon. The youth group was about to leave on a bus to take a short-term missions trip to Mexico. He introduced us as she was getting on the bus. She was a babe. She had great legs. I was smitten. She graduated in June and we were married in April. I was 23, she was not quite 19.

We had to get married. No, not because she was pregnant! I was in the process of becoming the church's youth pastor. The Senior Pastor did not believe the youth pastor should be single. That presented a dilemma. He would not offer me the full time position, unless I was married. My wife says our pastor arranged our marriage. Not true, but he certainly did speed up the engagement. By the next school year, I was no longer teaching at the Academy, but was in full-time ministry as a Youth Pastor. I had no idea what I was doing. They should not make youth pastors out of people who have never had teenagers themselves. I was just a kid myself and yet was supposed to be the expert on raising kids. I felt the same way when I began pastoring at the age of 27. I was supposed to tell people how to have a successful marriage, how to raise godly kids, how to manage finances, etc, yet had no experience in any of that. I did have the Bible however. I choose to simply teach and preach the Bible. I have tried to the best of my ability to keep my opinions and preferences out of my preaching. I seldom tell stories while preaching, that is why writing this story has been so awkward to me. Many of these things I have never told anybody, and certainly not from the pulpit. It was becoming a pastor for the first time and having to stick to the Bible that led to many of the changes in ministry and philosophy. I will deal with that later on.

My wife married into the staff of a large church. There is a lot of pressure on the staff of a large church. Even more in our situation. My wife always handled it well. I admire her for that. Being 19 years old and put on a pedestal is not easy. There was a lot expected of her. She went far and beyond the call of duty.

Soon after I joined the staff, our church decided to build a new building, including a 1500 seat auditorium, debt free! It was an amazing accomplishment and extremely hard on the staff. For the first 18 months of our marriage, I put in 12-14 hour days. We were called upon to do our ministry while putting in time at the building site. We were the free laborers. Not really free, but high paid gofers. Not really high paid either. Every night (except church nights) and every day off was put in at the building site. I realized I had gone to college to learn all the wrong things. I should have studied mixing mud (mortar), carrying brick, shoveling stone, hanging drywall, and various sundry duties. I don't regret it now, but I hated it then.

A few years ago I was back at my home church for my nephew's graduation. My pastor (now retired from the pastorate) was there. I met a man who asked when I served on staff. I replied, "1981-1987." He said what did you do? I said "Construction." My pastor replied, "glad to hear you say that because I never know what you did." When my pastor had something for you to do which wasn't in your job description (actually everything was in your job description), he would start by asking if you loved Jesus. That always irritated me, so I would respond, "I don't know, what does Jesus want me to do this time?" My bad attitude must have been rubbing off on another staff member because one day my pastor approached him and said, "Do you love Jesus?" My co-worker replied, "what does Jesus want me to do?" My pastor shot back, "Jesus wants you to stop hanging around Greg."

My family and the pastor went way back. I grew up at the church. My grandparents went there also. My grandmother and the pastor had a good relationship. My pastor is horrible at telling jokes. Especially from the pulpit. He would always mess up the punch line. The joke never turned out funny, but him messing it up was always funny. They used to sell these little battery operated laughing boxes. When you hit the button, this voice would start laughing. The longer you played it, the more you couldn't help but laugh along. Anybody remember those? Well, one Sunday, my grandmother brought her's to church. When my pastor tried to tell a joke she hit the button. Before long, the whole congregation was laughing hysterically. Back to the story, my wife and I did not have a day off together for the first year of our marriage. It was beginning to take a toll. My wife shared her frustration with my mom and grandmother. Shortly thereafter, my wife and I were both called into the pastor's office. It seems grandmother had chewed out the pastor for not giving me a day off. He was not happy. He said we should have gone to him. He made my wife cry. I starting getting days off after that.

Another unpleasant memory from those days was how the pastor would have a certain staff member call me to give me assignments to do on my day off. I got so I hated answering the phone and hearing his voice (how I wish we had caller id back then!). I didn't work for him, yet I got to despising him for being the bearer of bad news. I finally went to my pastor and told him he was being unfair to this other staff member, because this person was the recipient of hard feelings because he was bearing the brunt of being the bad guy. I told my pastor that I didn't work for this fellow and from now on, I felt the pastor should call me if he needed me to do something on my day off. To his credit, he was the one who called me from then on. Did I mention I wished we had caller id back then? My pastor was a very early riser. He had this habit of calling very early in the morning (like 6:00 am). Every single time he would say, "were you sleeping?" And every single time I would say "no, I was praying." Of course I was sleeping.

I once was blind, but now I see. During the construction of the new building, I was assigned to assist a welder. I didn't know anything about welding. I wasn't issued any protective goggles. All I was told was not to look at the light. We worked together for hours. That night, about 1:00 am I awoke in pain. I had trouble opening my eyes. I stumbled to the bathroom. I splashed water into my eyes. That was not the thing to do. The pain was horrible. I could not open my eyes. I yelled for my wife. She rushed me to the emergency room. As soon as the doctor saw me he said, "Were you helping someone weld today?" "Yes" I replied. He said I had welder's flash. He put some kind of suave in them and bandaged them shut. I was blind for 2 days. Since my wife was working, I went and stayed at my mom's house during the day. My sister took revenge for my years of tormenting her by slipping me horrible things to eat.

There was a man at the church who had been a former pastor who was there to be "restored" after he had an affair. He was a heavy equipment operator. He did much of the digging for the new construction. He and I did not get along. We called him "Leg Man" because he went to the school principal and turned in the names of girls who he thought their dresses were too short. He went to one of the women at church and told her that the slit in her skirt was too high. Building a building without using a lot of outside contractors led to a lot of jobs being done poorly and being done over. We had a leaking wall. We needed to dig down to the foundation and patch it with tar. This man dug out some and then said that the rest would have be be dug by hand, and gave me the job. After removing the mud, I covered the wall with tar. He replaced the dirt and the wall continued to leak. It had to be dug out again. The man said he could only get so close, so I would have to do the rest by hand. He said he could not possibly get any closer. I knew he could. I know he left as much for me to dig as he could get away with. So back I went. Did it all over again. Still leaked. This time, amazingly, he could dig right next to wall. And you don't believe in miracles. He eventually went back into the pastorate, then ran off with the church secretary.

The building had a seventy-foot tower covered with stone. There was scaffolding all around it, but for some reason the two sections of scaffolding didn't match up exactly. One day I was carrying a bucket of stone on the scaffolding. As I went to step from one section to the next, there was just the slightest difference in height. The section I was stepping onto was just a little lower than the one I had been walking on. For just that split second, it felt like I had accidentally stepped off the edge of the scaffolding. I thought I was falling to my death. After the tower was finished, a ten-foot tall metal cross was attached to the outside. The music pastor and I had the job of climbing the scaffolding and drilling holes into where the bolts were to go to fasten the cross to the tower. We were obviously the best choice for the job (not). It was a large drill motor. I tied it off to the scaffold, in case I dropped it. We were not tied to the scaffold however. As I was drilling, the bit got stuck and the drill began to twist. It was wrenched from my hands and I started to fall. I did the logical thing and grabbed on to the music pastor to keep me from falling. As we both started to fall, he was able to grab on the the scaffolding. We sat there and did not move for a long time. We both thought we were dead. If I died in the line of duty would that qualify as a martyrs' death? They could always say, he died building the church.

In due time, the building was completed. The last thing to be done was finishing the classrooms. Each class was assigned to get their room finished by the first service. We put hours into the youth room. We designed and painted it just like we wanted. The other youth workers and I worked hard to complete it on time. Shortly after we moved into the new building, they moved us into a different room.

One of the things I was privileged to do during my time there was to baptize believers. I had led a young man to Christ who was very tall. He was probably about 6'7" being an all state basketball and football player. While we were waiting to get into the baptistery, I warned him that when he came out, there might be a few laughs because of the difference in heights. I didn't want him to feel bad, I said they would be laughing at me. His unsaved family was in attendance. I should also mention that the pastor was not there that morning. This is significant because the congregation always took their cues from him as he sat on the platform. If he didn't laugh, no one else would either. I had already baptized several when this young man walked down into the pool. The entire congregation roared in laughter. I baptized him with no difficulty, but as he came out of the water he slung his hair to dry off, drenching the choir. The congregation laughed again. It was funny. I had no problem, but was worried his family would be embarrassed. That week I told the pastor what had happened. I could tell he was not pleased. The next Sunday, in his sermon, he said something like "some things are sacred to me. Like, I would never laugh at a baptism, would you?" Not anymore. By the way, I still love baptizing people and I every time make a joke and get people to laugh. It is a joyous occasion, why not enjoy it?

The church had a softball team. Being a large church, we obviously had a much larger talent pool. The league we were in was made up of much smaller churches. They didn't stand a chance. We took softball very seriously, and did not mind beating the other teams by as much as possible. This rightly led to a lot of hard feelings, but we enjoyed it. After going 16(wins) & 1(loss) for the season, we decided to leave the church league and join a league that played at a new multi-field complex, complete with outfield fences, lights and scoreboards. I went down to the park to sign us up for the next season.The man asked which division? I think there was A,B,C,&D, and each division had a high and low level. I said, well we are pretty good. Sign us up for B. He smiled. He said that was too high, he would sign us up for low C and if we did well, we could move up. That year we went 1 & 16. Quite a turn around! The next year we didn't have a church team, so I joined a team sponsored by a local bank that some of our players worked at. The first game I went 0 for 4. That of course is horrible for softball. After the game, I stopped by the church to pick up something. I was still in uniform. My pastor was there. He looked at my uniform. He asked what I was wearing. I told him I played softball for the bank. He said, "In the beer league?" I said "no, it's not a beer league." He replied, "do some of the players drink beer after the game?" I responded, "Probably, but I don't, and it's not a beer league." He said I could not play anymore, he didn't want his staff playing in a beer league. I asked if I could play one more night, please don't make me retire with an 0-fer (Zero for four batting). I had to quit with an .000 batting average. How embarrassing.

My pastor was not a sports fan. He never talked sports, was oblivious concerning sports. Here's an example. Before I left the church to go pastor a church in Florida, the pastor's son came on staff to eventually take my place. We always had an early Sunday Morning staff meeting in the pastor's office before the Sunday services. One Sunday morning, we were meeting and his son (Gary) told how his kids how been sick and how his wife had not been out of the house for days and hadn't been to church in a couple weeks. He asked if it would be alright for him to stay home that evening and let his wife come to church. The pastor (his dad) said that seemed OK. We (there were probably 5 or 6 of us on the pastoral staff) all started laughing.  The pastor asked what was so funny. I replied that it was kind of convenient since the Superbowl happened to be on that night. The pastor changed his mind and Gary came to church that evening. (Of course, this was long before the Superbowl became the national holiday it is today).

Did I mention I am a big Cincinnati Sports fan? When Pete Rose was chasing the all time hits record, during the off season, my brother and I looked ahead to the upcoming season and bought tickets to several games in which we projected that Pete might set the record.There was this Tuesday night game at Riverfront after an off day on Monday following a long road trip. Anybody who loved Pete and knew his love for Cincinnati, knew Pete would not allow himself to break the record while playing an away game. Since he was a player/manager, he could control his number of at bats. Sure enough, on a Sunday night in Chicago, Pete tied Ty Cobb for the all time number of hits in the Major Leagues. Tuesday was the big day and my brother and I had tickets! On our way into the sold out stadium, where the networks were carrying each at bat live and where the commissioner of baseball was in attendance, people were begging for tickets. I think we were offered as much as $500. No way was I selling that ticket. This was the (nonspiritual & non marital) highlight of my entire existence. We were so pumped. Every time Pete came to bat the capacity crowd roared, the cameras flashed and TV broadcasts were interrupted. Four times this happened and four times we sat down disappointed. 0 for 4. He broke the record the next night. I couldn't even see it on TV because it was visitation night at the church, so I sat in the parking lot at UDF and listened to it on radio.

That wasn't the only big Red's moment I missed. Besides Pete, my other big hero was Johnny Bench. Greatest catcher ever. I hadn't been married long when Bench announced his retirement. Again, my brother and I bought tickets, but this time we had to bring our wives. Newlywed mistake. The Reds were playing the Astros. Johnny had been playing third base (if management had let him play first, he would not have been retiring), but for this game he played catcher one last time. Somewhere around the fourth inning my wife began to nag me about needing something to drink. She did not understand what a momentous occasion this was, she should be fasting. She continued to nag me (I love you honey). Finally the Astros were coming to bat. I figured I had plenty of time to get to the concession stand and back before the Reds were up, I mean what idiot would be at the concession stand at such a time as this! Imagine my surprise when I find a large line. I finally arrived at the window and placed my order. At the very instant I received my wife's drink, the stadium erupted. It literally shook. I know what had happened. I rushed up the stairs, just in time to see Johnny come out of the dugout and tip his cap. His last home run and I am buying my wife a Pepsi. When I got to the top of the steps a guy I did not even know looked at me, he said, "did you miss it?" I couldn't even speak, but I managed to nod my head. He said, "I am so sorry." I said, "not as sorry as my ex-wife is going to be." We did not own a television in those days. So I did not see the replay on the news, in fact, I have never seen number 398. No, we have never been to a ball game together again. Yes, we are still married.

I have always worked Sundays. Therefore, I have had very few opportunities to go to Bengal's games. I have gone to exactly one Sunday game. The Bengals were playing Joe Montana and the Forty-niners. To go to the game, my brother and I had to leave after the morning service and I had to be back by Sunday night pre-service prayer meeting (5:00 pm). We arrived at the game just a little after kick-off. Late in the fourth quarter, the Bengals had a five point lead and the ball. There was very little time remaining on the clock. There was no way they could lose. We left the stadium and headed for our car. As we were walking down Pete Rose Way we heard a collective groan escape from the stadium. We stared at each other in confusion. About this time a guy drove by in a pickup truck. He yelled out the window, the Bengals lost! No way, it was impossible. We ran to the car and turned on the radio. Long time Bengals announcer Phil Samp was incredulous. The Bengals had failed to run out the clock and turned the ball over on downs with ONE second remaining.  Montana hit Rice for a TD. Bengals lose. Now the rest of the story...

The next day I am riding in the car with the pastor (i.e. my boss). He states what an incredible game that was yesterday. Now he never, ever talked football. We never discussed sports (except boxing). Now I am between a rock and a hard place. Does he know I went to the game? Is he waiting for me to fess up? If I don't admit I went, what will the fallout be? If I do fess up and he doesn't know I went, then what will be the repercussions? Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?

What to do? The pressure was intense, he kept talking about it. Finally I sobbed, yes I know, I was there! It got eerily quiet. He didn't know I was in attendance at the game. I have shot myself in the foot. The next day the staff all got a letter in our mail boxes. It had one point. We do not go to sporting events on the Lord's Day!

On April 23, 1983 Sharon and I were married. Besides being a beautiful, Christian young lady, she was the perfect pastor's wife. She could type, sing and play the piano! One of the best magazine cartoons I've seen, shows a woman pastor being interviewed by a pulpit committee. They ask her, "so does your husband play the piano?" I know there have been many times that Sharon wishes she didn't play the piano, because for many years she was never able to worship like everybody else, but always had things to do. I accept that as coming with the territory as a pastor, but I realize she wasn't called to be a pastor, she just married one. She has been a huge part of my ministry, while being a godly wife and mother.

Poor Sharon, I am not a romantic. I didn't consult her about her style of engagement ring, I didn't propose to her during a candlelight dinner. I did every thing wrong. I didn't have any money saved up for a real honeymoon. God has blessed us with two fine sons-in-law. They did everything right. Picked the perfect rings, asked my permission first and then surprised my daughters with romantic proposals. It was all very nice and memorable. I was a dope. We never did have a real honeymoon and the 25th anniversary cruise we talked about taking for years still hasn't happened. I am amazed at how quickly time flies. 

We had about 600 people at our wedding. Our church was in the midst of a church-wide campaign called, "Please Him" taken from John 8:29. In our wedding pictures there is this large banner above our heads that reads, "Please Him." She always has. When Sharon went back to work after the wedding and showed the wedding pictures to her unchurched co-workers, they thought the banner was part of the wedding decorations. Everything they thought about fundamentalism was true after all.

On Sunday mornings the pastoral staff had to wear suits, ties and white shirts. But dress codes didn't just apply to us men. The wives of the pastors had a dress code too. Ours just applied to church time, the wives was 24/7. Well, thankfully not at bedtime. Pantyhose had to be worn to all church functions, including 4th of July picnics. Sharon had graduated from the church's school so she was used to wearing culottes and no slacks, but dressing up every time you're in public was a chore. Yes, we still believe in modesty.

This is a good time to clarify something. I don't regret my time spent on the staff at my home church. I will be eternally grateful that my pastor hired a 21 year old kid, that he overlooked my blunders. I learned a lot. My pastor was my mentor. We have a good relationship. He taught me a lot about leadership. He taught me to have a high work ethic (as did my dad) and regular office hours. He taught me to have a love for missions and a heart for missionaries. He taught me to have compassion on the sick and elderly. I am who I am today because of my time spent there. I am a pastor because of him. I believe I am the logical outcome of what I was taught. I was taught to love the Word of God. I was taught that the Bible is to be the final standard. I was taught to be an independent thinker.  I am all of those, but being that has led me to see things differently. My love for the Word prevents me from preaching man's opinion as if it is gospel truth. It keeps me from holding to the IFB party line. I am not an Independent Fundamental Baptist anymore. I do not want to be in that movement. However, I am as independent, fundamental and baptistic has ever, in fact maybe more so. I know what the fundamentals of our faith are, and they have nothing to do with clothing or hair or music styles, or Bible versions. I am independent enough to stand on what I know the Bible teaches while others who should know better refuse to speak up. I know that Baptists historically were Calvinists.

My time at my home church prepared me to make decisions later in life that changed me. I don't regret that. Later, I will detail how becoming a pastor forced me to confront some of things I was taught to hold dear. I will explain what and why I changed.

January 11, 1986 was one of the happiest days of my life. January 11, 1986 was one of the saddest days of my life. Every January 11 since 1986 was been a day of celebration. Every January 11 since 1986 was been twinged with "what if?" January 11, 1986 started out earlier than most days. About 2 o'clock in the morning, my wife woke me, saying she thought she was in labor. Now, she wasn't due until March, so I said what every loving, concerned, intelligent man would say, I told her to go back to sleep. She did what every submissive, patient, loving wife would do, she called her mother. Her mother responded, what are you calling me for, you should be on your way to the hospital. So off we went. The hospital was about thirty minutes away via the expressway. I remember speeding along the expressway, hoping a policeman would pull me over, so I could say, "My wife's having twins!" Then he would say, follow me! And I would fly behind a police escort all the way to Christ Hospital. No such luck.

Side note. On the day I found out that we were having a multiple birth, I did wreck our brand new car. I can still recall the details vividly. I was driving down the road and noticed that a cup of pop had soaked through and filled our holder with pop. So as I was trying to clean it up with some Kleenex, I wasn't watching the road. Like it was in slow motion, I looked up to see that I had missed a slight curve and was headed straight for a telephone pole. I can remember glancing to my left and seeing a man watering his lawn and watching me head for the pole. I remember thinking, he must think I am an idiot. I hit the pole head on, snapped it in half. Live wires were draped over the hood. I wasn't wearing my seat belt, and it was before airbags, but by the grace of God I wasn't too badly injured. Sprained wrists (bent the steering wheel) and stitches in a busted chin. The man ran over and said he had called the police, but he wasn't going to touch the car (totaled by the way) because of the wires. Eventually they got me out with the "jaws of life." The EMTs insisted on a neck brace and a back board on the way to the hospital, in spite of my protests. In the ambulance I asked them if they were going to check my underwear. Mom always said to wear clean underwear, you'd never know when you might be in an accident. I was quite disappointed to find that they didn't check to make sure. All that laundry for nothing.

Sharon's OBYGN meet us at the hospital. He said that being six weeks early, that they would give her medicine in an IV to stop the contractions and hopefully buy more time. So they started the meds. Later he came in with a portable sonogram machine to check on the babies. He grew very quiet. He kept going over the same area. He looked puzzled. Eventually he said that these small machines weren't very accurate (sonograms then looked nothing like today's!) and that he was sending us downstairs to the big machine. They wheeled Sharon downstairs with me following. For a reason I have never understood, the technician made me wait outside, as she did the exam. I waited in the hallway for a long time. Suddenly she came rushing out of the room and ran down the hall. When she returned she was with two doctors. A few minutes later the doctors came out into the hallway. "Mr. Wilson, your wife is having triplets." We were expecting twins. They continued, "One of them is not viable." I replied, "You mean one is dead?" "Yes and we need to deliver the others immediately because they are in distress." Cynthia Suzanne was stillborn. Jacqueline Nicole and Lauren Danielle were born at 3 lbs and 4 oz but otherwise healthy. Six weeks later we brought them home. And now they are gone, with families of their own. Six and a half years later God gave us a son, Christopher Brett. They won't admit it, but every dad wants a boy. God gave me a fine son and I am proud of him.

When the twins were about three years old and we were living in another state, The OBGYN that delivered the twins called our home. He said that one of the doctors who had assisted him in the birth of the girls had recently died of AIDS. He felt that it would be prudent for Sharon to be tested for the virus. So we went to the doctor for her to have an AIDS test. This was in the early days of the AIDS scare, everybody was terrified of the word. The test had to be sent to the lab and the results would take a few (nerve wracking) days. A few days later, the phone rang at my office at church. Why they rang that number I do not know, but they asked for Sharon Wilson. I said this is her husband. The person calling replied that she had the results of the test, but that she could not tell me! I had to have Sharon call. We lived in a parsonage. I remember walking from the church to my house with a lump in my throat. One thought was in my head. If it had been good news, the lady would have told me. Since she had to tell Sharon, it must be bad news. It was the longest walk of my life. Nonchalantly I walked in the door and said, Oh yeah, the doctor called, you are supposed to call them back. No big deal. I didn't tell her I was nauseous with worry. She called, everything was fine, praise the Lord.

Christopher has always been very insightful. He is a thinker. When he was five years old, the church was in the process of selling our property and relocating. The membership had given an unanimous vote to proceed. A man started coming during this time, who was not a member and was very vocal about his belief that we should not be wasting money on a new building. One evening during a Bible study, he used the opportunity to express publicly his disagreement with the church's direction. I finally had enough. After the service I asked him and the deacons to join me in my office. I proceeded to explain to him in no uncertain terms that what he has just done was inappropriate and also that since he was not a member it was none of his business. I then told him to keep his mouth shut or do not come back to the services. After everyone left my office, I found Christopher hiding under my desk! He had heard the whole ordeal. On the way home, he said to his mom, "Daddy talked to that man like he was his daddy!"

When he was younger, Christopher was fascinated by that fact that my job was at the church. He realized this was not normal. He asked me how I got paid. I told him that I got a paycheck just like everybody else. He wanted to know where the paycheck came from. I told him the church paid me. How did the church pay me? I told him that the men took up the offering and the treasurer deposited it in the bank and then wrote me a check. That week he was over at the house of a couple in the church. They wanted to order pizza, but didn't have any cash. Christopher said, why don't you do like my daddy does for cash, he gets it out of the offering plate!

Christopher and I went to see the movie Valkyrie recently. It is a true story about a failed assassination attempt on Hitler. On the ride home he asked me what I thought the effect would have been on the war if the plot had succeeded. I said, not much, some lives saved, but the war was almost over by that time, so not a huge difference. He said I was wrong. If the assassination had been successful and Germany had surrendered then, Russia would have never made it to Germany and there would have never been a Berlin Wall or a communist East Germany, and the U.S.S.R would have been radically altered. Wow. I told you he was a thinker.

I was reading a book in which the author was making the point that TV executives were in the business of selling viewers, not commercials. The commercials sell themselves (i.e. The Superbowl) if there are enough viewers. So what really was being sold was us. I had never thought of it that way. That day, as Christopher and I were driving somewhere, I told him I had read something that was profound. I asked him, what are TV executives selling? He thought for a moment and then replied. Us. I said what? He said yea, if we aren't watching, nobody is going to purchase commercial time, so they aren't selling commercials, they are selling us. Little brat. 

In December of 1987, after serving seven years at my home church, I was called to be the new pastor at Immanuel Baptist Church in Ft. Pierce, Florida. It was a big change and it changed me. I would say changed for the good, others would say for the bad. When I was the youth pastor at my home church, I was assisted by a large number of youth workers. I had as many as 13 couples at a time, working in the Jr. & Sr. High ministries (by the way, five of those couples ended up divorced). We often had over 100 kids attend youth group activities. I remember my first service at Immanuel. As I scanned the crowd, it dawned on me that there were less people in attendance that night than I had working for me in the youth ministry. There were other shocks about to come.

Immanuel Baptist had a tumultuous history. Under the founding pastor it had grown to nearly 400 attendees. It had a record high attendance of over 1,000 (remember it was in the heyday of the bus ministry era). The church was situated on a nice piece of property and had an auditorium that sat about 300 and a nice, but unfinished Sunday School wing that housed a small Christian School. It's better days were behind it. By the time I arrived on the scene, the attendance (not counting the bus ministry) was about 30-40 and we were about to go broke.

I had no idea (at the age of 27) what I was getting into. All I knew was, I wanted to pastor and they would have me. That was enough. I don't regret it, although I would do so many things differently now. God was gracious to us for the five years I was there. We didn't always get paid, and our son was born without any maternity insurance coverage, which put us in a financial hole that we have never really recovered from (Sharon & I were totally debt free before he was born, but of course we lived in a parsonage).

Twelve years after starting the church, the founding pastor left to become a traveling evangelist. The church then called a wolf in sheep's clothing. I don't fault anybody but him (I will call him Dr. Wolf, he was another of those fundamentalist doctors). However there were signs that Dr. Wolf should not have been called. He had been a candidate while pastoring another congregation up north. Another man was called by Immanuel to become the pastor, so Dr. Wolf took a church in the Northeast. After Dr. Wolf had been there for one month, the man who Immanuel called decided not to accept. Immanuel then contacted Dr. Wolf and offered him the position, which he immediately took, leaving his new flock behind. Obviously a hireling, as would become more evident.

I can only report on what I have been told. I believe the things I am about to say are true, because I lived the aftermath. During his time at Immanuel, Dr. Wolf embezzled money, committed insurance fraud, had an extramarital affair and punched the school principal in the face before a church business meeting. He often lost his temper, challenged others to fight him during Christian School athletic events and lied about many things. Of course, I found out most of this after I became pastor. His legacy was a ruined reputation for Immanuel Baptist Church (some of these transgressions made the media). Here is the first thing I would do differently. We should have changed the name of the church. Every time I would invite someone to church, they would say, "Isn't that the church where...?" When we did manage to get someone to attend, they were greeted with a 300 seat auditorium with less than 50 people in it. So, the second thing I should have done was somehow remodeled the size of the auditorium. Perhaps removed pews, added walls, used a different configuration, anything. Guests in a mostly empty auditorium quickly realize something is amiss, besides the impossibility of filling that space with good sounding singing, etc.

Shortly after becoming the pastor, we got a notice that the church's electric bill was overdue and they were going to shut off the power. I called the power company to see if we could work something out. They said they would check and get back with me. They called me back to say that for a long time we had mistakenly been billed for a street light that wasn't really on our property. After crediting us the refund, we were paid in full! The next crisis was when I discovered that the church had not been able to make regular payments into the church bond "sinking fund" and there were bonds due with no money to pay them off. Add to that fact, none of the bond holders had anything to do with Immanuel any more! Again, God graciously intervened. I was able to track down the bond holders, several of them agreed to not cash them and instead give them back (which they did not have to do). The rest were held by one old man in town who had been friends with the founding pastor, but who was not a believer and had never attended Immanuel. The founding pastor put in a good word for me and the man agreed to hold the bonds until we were able to pay (which we eventually did). Praise the Lord!

So, as I said, a big change from what I was used to. Youth pastors never have to worry about church finances. Youth pastors benefit from the good reputation of the church. Youth pastors don't have to worry about much. And they don't have to preach four times a week. This led to the next big change. Me!

I am a pastor because God gifted me to be one. I don't know what I think anymore about the "call." If the only thing I had to go on was that at the age of 12 I felt "called" to preach, I would not still be doing it. If a 12 year old boy came to me and said he felt "called" to preach, I would tell him not so fast! I am still pastoring because that gift has been reaffirmed many times. I have been very blessed by those who have been blessed by my preaching and teaching. I know God gifted me to teach the Bible. I am a pastor because of God and because of my pastor. He inspired me, encouraged me, mentored me, and pointed me toward the pastorate. However, I am the pastor I am today, because of John MacArthur. I know some of you reading this are thinking that is what went wrong with me. So be it. I was not raised on expository preaching, in fact we were warned against it. When I discovered the joy, the power, the thrill of expository preaching, I was a changed man. I began to understand what Paul meant when he said "Preach the Word!" I began to comprehend that the authority was in the word preached, not the preacher. I have no authority outside of God's word. My opinions, my preferences, my likes and dislikes have no authority. I am not to preach the opinions of men, but the Word of God.

This revelation led to a crisis in my life. I no longer could preach on (actually against) many of the Independent Fundamental Baptist themes. Women wearing slacks, going to the movies, card playing, smoking, dancing, mixed bathing (swimming) just weren't addressed in the Bible. I wanted to preach the Bible. I could not in good conscience preach against these things, they were only man's opinion. Now I know there are IFBs that don't preach these things. I just didn't know it then. 

I love to read. Leaders are readers. Not all IFBs are readers. I had an IFB evangelist brag to me that he never read a book in his life, only the KJV Bible. I believed him, his preaching showed it. I had a young pastor visit our church while on vacation. I took him into my office to talk. He noticed all my books. He said until he had read everything John R. Rice had written, he wasn't going to read anything else. I thought he was joking. I laughed, and he got upset.

My father and my pastor passed on their love for reading to me. I began to see the bigger picture, and that there were good, Bible believing, separated Christians outside of IFBs. In fact, their books were deep, not the pablum I had been exposed to in college. I began to read real theology. It stretched me, challenged me, changed me. Which led to my next crisis of faith. How could all these godly theologians be so wrong about the Bible? I mean the King James Bible. Didn't they know that other versions were perversions? How could they be so blind? Wait, was it possible that I was the one blind?

I had left the Ruckmanism behind after college. I now took the Textus Receptus approach. The KJV wasn't perfect, but it was based on better manuscripts. So I started to read about textual criticism. I studied the difference between the Textus Receptus and the Majority text. I began to waver in my convictions. However, I still was not ready to leave the KJV fold, at least not while I was pastoring a church that had been taught the KJV only position.

I spent a month in Haiti one week. I was only there for seven days, but it seemed much longer. I took a short term missions trip with another pastor friend to visit his missionary in Haiti. It was quite an adventure. To start with, we were warned that the Airline that flew into Haiti often overbooked, so it was advisable to get to the airport very early, to insure you got a seat on your flight. We arrived at our gate at least an hour early. There was no one else there. We sat down to wait right next to the gate. We would be the first three guys (he brought another man from his church) in line. Gradually the seating area began to fill up. Then it became crowded. We were glad to be right next to the boarding area. We were perched on the edge of our seats ready to spring into action. Finally an employee stepped behind the counter. He grabbed the microphone and began to talk in Creole. Eveybody except us was from Haiti. So they used Creole before English. So everybody got in line while we sat there wondering what the guy was saying. After waiting for over an hour, we were the last in line. As we boarded, the stewardess asked us (the only three white guys) if we were together! I said, what gave it away? This was the beginning of the "boom box" era. Everybody in line, except us, had a boom box as their carry on. I am not kidding. I guess boom boxes were hard to get in Haiti, so if you get to the states, pick one up and bring it home.

My pastor friend was a very large man. He weighed over 300 pounds. You don't see any fat people in Haiti. It is such a poor country. In fact, the missionary told us he didn't any longer bring the Haitian pastors to the states, because once they actually experienced our standard of living, it ruined them. They did not want to go back and live like a Haitian. He told me of one Haitian pastor standing in the food aisle at the grocery story in tears looking at all the food. The only slightly overweight person we saw in Haiti was an army officer. Undoubtedly, he ate at other people's expense. It was definitely a military state at that time. You had to have your "papers" and a bribe to move around the country.

They called my pastor friend "gro blonde" (my transliteration). It meant "big whitey." People stared at him everywhere we went. They would follow him around and try to poke him. He was the Pillsbury dough boy personified. We were in a taxi in Port-au-prince. I think we were stopped at the only traffic light in Haiti. People began to congregate on the corner to look into the taxi. There were waving at passerbys to come and look. You don't see many white people in Haiti to start with, but fat white people are a special treat.

We were speaking at a national pastor's training camp in the mountains. To get there, we had to cross a river (no bridge). The water was up, but the missionary who was driving the jeep said not to worry. We got about 1/3 of the way across when water began to flow in. The jeep started to float. This was quite a feat considering "gro blond" was in it. We were no longer heading across the river, but down it! We were told to abandon ship. There was a group of Haitian men on the other side watching this unfold. I know they were thinking, stupid Americans.  I grabbed the closest briefcase and held it over my head. My pastor friend grabbed a briefcase and held it over his head. We began to walk across the river. The current was strong. I did not think I was going to make it. I was going to drown for the cause of Christ. It was very scary. When we made it across, we had saved each others briefcases (which held our Bibles), but everything else was wet. We paid the men that were standing there laughing to get a rope and pull the jeep to shore.

Speaking of the river, I will never forget the scene. Up stream there were some folks using the river as a toilet. A little down stream, some people were taking a bath. Down stream from there, some women were washing their dishes. I thought, could you at least reverse that process, please. 

We stayed at a compound in a small mountain village. The only electric power was from a generator that only ran a few hours a day. The only toilet was an outhouse that was exclusively for the guest pastors. We slept in a concrete block storage room. We had to bring our own food and water. At night, it was pitch black. You could hear the voodoo drums. My pastor friend and I slept on cots in the storage room. It held our food supplies. It was as black as could be inside. I could hear the rats rummaging through our cans. As I was lying there in the dark, something landed on my chest. It was there for a few seconds then jumped off. I knew it had to be a rat. I said to my friend, are you awake? He just snored. I stayed awake the rest of the evening worrying that another rat was going to jump on me and start eating my face. In the morning, my friend asked if I had said something during the night. I said yea. He said, well I remember flopping my arm over and hitting you in the chest, but was too tired to worry about it. That's ok, I did enough worrying for both of us.

 On our last day, we were staying in Port-au-prince. Our room had a short wave radio. We were listening to an American newscast. You may have read that I was a big Pete Rose fan. The baseball commissioner, Bart Giamatti had only a few days ago banned Pete Rose from baseball. Six days later, Mr. Giamatti was dead. I said to my friend "touch not the Lord's anointed." 

While living in Florida, we often heard about the attempts of Haitians to reach the United States. Whole families would try to cross over in makeshift rafts. Many would not survive the journey. I used to wonder why they would attempt such a dangerous trip. Until I visited Haiti. I am telling you, the Haitian who makes it to the United States and who lives under a freeway overpass, has it better off than he did in Haiti.

One afternoon, the secretary buzzed my office and told me that there was a very famous (now infamous) preacher on the phone who wanted to talk to me. Now, I am a joker. I have played many practical jokes. I didn't believe that this big shot preacher was really calling little old me. I figured it had to be one of my buddies, so I picked up the phone, "Dr. So and So, what a joy to speak to you!" The man began to talk small talk. He was trying to be gracious. I, however, am trying to figure out from the voice who this was pulling my leg. I finally decided it was a friend of mine name Bob _____. I interrupted, Dr. So and So, do you know Bob ______? No, he replied, don't believe I do. Well, I said, he's a real jerk. Silence filled the phone line. After a few awkward moments, the man said, well the reason I am calling is, I call all the IFB preachers in Florida and invite them to bring their young people to our church camp. It dawns on me, I am an idiot. This is really Dr. So and So, and I have made the biggest fool of myself. I thanked him and hung up the phone. I didn't try to explain. I lived in a parsonage about 30 yards from the church. I ran out of my office, to my house. I burst through the door and huffed and puffed to my wife, I am an idiot! She replied that was old news.

Several months later, I was at the college Dr. So and So founded and was eating lunch with him. He never mentioned the phone call, but I know he was thinking, this is that idiot I called.  I remember discussing the Pete Rose ban. I told him, as I told many people over the years, Pete is a whore monger (he cheated on his wife) he is profane, he is arrogant, but he would never, ever bet on baseball. Did I mention I am an idiot?

After five years, in which I made some dear friends, I realized that Immanuel was never going to overcome it's obstacles. I began to pray and think about what to do. By this time, we had closed our Christian School. My girls went to kindergarten at a Christian School on the other side of town. The church and school had outgrown its location. They were land locked. The church's beliefs were very similar to ours. I respected the pastor. I decided to approach him with a radical idea. I asked him to pray with me about it. We would not share it with anyone else, until we prayed it over and thought it through. I felt that we should merge the congregations. They could sell their property, move the church and school to our site, take the money from the sale and finish our building. He would stay as the pastor, I would resign. I had nowhere to go, I hadn't been looking for greener pastures. In fact, I was crushed to discover that I was not going to pastor there my whole ministry. My pastor had stayed at one church his whole ministry, and I wanted to do that also. It was not to be. I wasn't sure I even wanted to pastor again. I knew I couldn't be a IFB pastor anymore. I was perfectly content to leave the ministry and be a faithful layman.

Eventually, that pastor and I decided it was a workable plan and that we should approach our respective deacon boards about the possibility. Then as boards we began to think and pray it through. After both boards were in agreement, we approached the congregations. I had to make one thing clear to the good folks at Immanuel. I was leaving either way. I wasn't leaving for a better place, I was just leaving. They could call another pastor, or they could admit our lack of a viable future and merge. Both groups overwhelmingly agreed to merge. The other congregation sold their property, paid off all the debts and finished the building, making a very nice Christian School facility. A stronger church was produced, instead of two more churches of like faith in the same town, there was one less. It was a good move that I don't regret.

There is a final irony however. The only sticking point was the KJV. The other congregation was not as strict about other versions as we were. The pastor only preached from the KJV, but nothing in their constitution required it. So a vote was taken to make an official policy to only use the KJV from the pulpit. It was my parting gift to the good folks at Immanuel, even though I know I was not KJV only any more. Immanuel Baptist Church went out of existence and I headed north to who knew what.